Solving Our Addiction

Dear editor:

A while back the president said that the United States is addicted to oil. He is right, even though he left out the fact that the rest of the world, both industrial and developing nations are too. With the growth of population, the increased use of cars, and the worldwide increase of industry, we as a planet are using and needing more and more oil. The usage is an addiction that is similar to an alcoholic needing more whiskey or a drug addict needing more and more heroin. There is never enough and the need grows in leaps and bounds.

This addiction to oil is causing major financial problems for our country (and the rest of the world) and we are seeing not only the price of gasoline go through the roof, but the cost of everything we consume skyrocket in price. It effects our entire lifestyle. The sad part is that no end for this problem is in sight. This worldwide addiction is not only causing financial problems but is also causing increased global warming that threatens the future of our entire planet.

The president has suggested that one possible solution for the United States is by drilling for more oil in the Alaskan Wildlife Refuge and offshore of our coastline, thereby reducing our use of foreign, imported oil. He also said our nation can help its economy by everyone going shopping. Neither will help this addiction. Neither will it help the problem of global warming which has taken the administration seven and a half years to even admit that it exists. It also seems that the President and Vice-President fail to realize that additional “American oil” is part of a worldwide usage and we do not pay any less for domestic oil and gasoline than we do for imported oil. As a matter of fact, our country exports “American oil” to the rest of the world.

Last week he made a meaningless gesture of lifting executive orders banning the drilling of oil off our shorelines. In order for this to be effective Congress must also pass a law lifting this ban, which is very doubtful. He, along with Sen. McCain’s very vocal agreement, has made this a political calling.

But what does more oil do for the addiction to oil usage? It doesn’t solve it, but rather feeds it with more supply. If someone is addicted to alcohol would you increase their supply of booze as a solution to their problem? If a friend was addicted to crack cocaine or heroin would you stop their addiction by making it more available and easier to get by increasing the supply, and therefore lowering the price? Of course not. That is complete idiocy and makes the problem worse instead of possibly helping the addict.

Our one and only solution is to break our addiction by developing and using other methods for energy instead of fossil fuels. If we want to stop our flow of dollars out of the country and into the hands of oil rich Arab states, help our economy and stop destroying our planet with global warming, we must start using alternate means of powering our world. And we must start NOW. We must show the rest of the world that we are once again a leader instead of a follower. Drilling and shopping won’t do it.

Inflation Can Be Beaten

News item today, July 15, 2008 (Washington Post):

“The Labor Department reported that soaring costs for gasoline and food pushed inflation at the wholesale level up by a bigger-than-expected 1.8 percent in June, leaving inflation rising over the past year at the fastest pace in more than a quarter-century. Over the past 12 months, wholesale prices are up 9.2 percent, the largest year-over-year surge since June 1981, another period when soaring energy costs were giving the country inflation pains.”

At the same time, the Labor Department pointed out that this inflationary jump included major increases in the cost of fuel and food. If those two items are dropped out of the equation inflation is a much lower number. So I guess the thing to do is; don’t drive your car, don’t cool or heat your house, don’t feed your family, don’t use electricity, and don’t use anything that involves plastic. Do all of these and your family will not feel the effects of inflation. Doesn’t that make you feel better?

Truth or Fiction on the Internet

Dear editor:

It is amazing how much is spread on the internet in the name of “truth” which is actually “political fiction” and damaging to the perception of many who don’t know the difference between the two. Many people wrongly believe that if they read it on the internet it must be true and continue to forward these stories to everyone they know. These distortions and fabrications are meant to harm those running for office and in effect harm our country and our political system. They were damagingly effective against Sen. John McCain in his presidential 2000 run against George Bush, destroyed the 2004 effort of Sen. John Kerry in his run for the White House, and have taken hold against Sen. Barack Obama with the claims that he is a “closet Muslim” out to destroy the United States.

Politics has become dirtier and dirtier and now there is a major internet push to prove that President Bush and his pre-emptive war against Iraq is nothing new, as Democratic presidents have attacked countries that “never fired a shot” at our country. Their examples are dastardly and anyone with the smallest bit of historical knowledge would know lies when they saw them. They bring up three so-called examples.

First they claim that President Franklin Roosevelt took us into war against Germany even though that Nazi regime had never done anything against the U.S. In actuality, our country was attacked at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 by the Empire of Japan and Congress at the urging of FDR declared war on that country as a result. Four days later Nazi Germany, as an ally of Japan and a member of their Axis Pact, declared war on the United States. Italy followed suit and as a result America was drawn into the European War.

Next they state that President Harry Truman took us into a war against North Korea, a country that had never attacked America. How easily people choose to forget. The United States, in cooperation with the United Nations, answered a call for help from South Korea when it was attacked by North Korea. South Korea was an ally of the U.S. just like Kuwait was assisted by America at the urging of President George H.W. Bush. Both were defensive moves against invasion of our allies and therefore justified.

Finally, the internet phony historians claim that Presidents Kennedy and Johnson invaded Vietnam even though we had not been shot at once by anyone. Here again, we answered a call from an ally, South Vietnam, when it was invaded by North Vietnam, as was the case with both Kuwait and South Korea. While the U.S. did not start that war, the shame of it was that it was allowed to go on for so long and at a horrible cost of lives and treasury. Today we are repeating that mistake in Iraq, a country that truly never fired a shot at us and had no Weapons of Mass Destruction (a fact that has been proven over and over again.) We must be careful to remember that it was Afghanistan that harbored the terrorists of 9/11, which justified our war against that regime, even though we have bungled it badly.

We must be careful in what we read on the internet and seek the truth before taking the convenient path of unknowingly spreading lies to others. Check it out first.